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2021 Mercruiser 6.2l Sterndrive Failure

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Velvet Red

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Just seeing if there are others that have had this experience. I have a 2021 Monterey with the 6.2 Bravo 3 2.20 sterndrive. At 54 hours I had a complete sterndrive failure due to a bearing according to the local dealer. It is quite a bite in the wallet as it is out of warranty and Mercruiser will not help. I’m replacing the entire assembly - upper and lower as metal from the bearing destroyed most of the internals and the case. The local dealer stated it was a bad bearing and I am still acquiring more information. I did buy the boat used from a dealer that was owned by an employees at the dealer and service records check out. I did not abuse or hit anything and put four hours on it and destroyed. When I took it it why we’re going to replace the cone clutch but noticed much more. The symptoms I experienced were it would not go into drive, if it is catch it would not move very fast at idle, just over idle the boat stumbled and slipped, upper RPM ran fine. I was told the linkage was out of adjustment which may have caused partial engagement and could have hurt the cone clutch. But then the bearing failure took all of this out. I had had the outdrive serviced about two weeks prior to the failure by an authorized dealer.

I’m very car engine and transmission knowledgeable but not with out drives but I am going to learn. Just hoping this is not a common experience. I take great care of everything I own and never have issues with anything as I am an over maintainer.

One reason I am posting is to get this logged on line in case others have had similar issues and we see a trend.

I’m a little soured and skittish but not going to let this drive me out of boating…yet.
 
Velvet Red said:
Just seeing if there are others that have had this experience. I have a 2021 Monterey with the 6.2 Bravo 3 2.20 sterndrive. At 54 hours I had a complete sterndrive failure due to a bearing according to the local dealer. It is quite a bite in the wallet as it is out of warranty and Mercruiser will not help. I’m replacing the entire assembly - upper and lower as metal from the bearing destroyed most of the internals and the case. The local dealer stated it was a bad bearing and I am still acquiring more information. I did buy the boat used from a dealer that was owned by an employees at the dealer and service records check out. I did not abuse or hit anything and put four hours on it and destroyed. When I took it it why we’re going to replace the cone clutch but noticed much more. The symptoms I experienced were it would not go into drive, if it is catch it would not move very fast at idle, just over idle the boat stumbled and slipped, upper RPM ran fine. I was told the linkage was out of adjustment which may have caused partial engagement and could have hurt the cone clutch. But then the bearing failure took all of this out. I had had the outdrive serviced about two weeks prior to the failure by an authorized dealer.

I’m very car engine and transmission knowledgeable but not with out drives but I am going to learn. Just hoping this is not a common experience. I take great care of everything I own and never have issues with anything as I am an over maintainer.

One reason I am posting is to get this logged on line in case others have had similar issues and we see a trend.

I’m a little soured and skittish but not going to let this drive me out of boating…yet.
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What you describe is rare. Of course stern drives can fail, but if it didn’t run low on lube or have water in it I would say it is an oddball. What did the dealer who you bought it from say? What about who serviced it ?
 
Thanks. I thought this would be rare. There are boats running on every lake innthe country that are 20 plus years old. I am still collecting information.

The dealer I bought it from is not helpful basically that it is out of warranty. Seems to have been serviced annually. Many lessons learned here. I’m going to analyze the outdrive that has gone bad when I go to the dealer I took it to for the new one when I pick it up. I’ll report anything I find out if it is worth noting. I’m in a number of Jeep forums and we like it when people that post provide final outcomes after the issues have been resolved.
 
You don't mention which bearing went out and under what conditions.
There are all kinds of el cheapo bearings out there on ebay and Amazon. It's awful tempting to buy them rather than the expensive Quicksilver parts. Without knowing whether this drive has been apart before, you can't really blame Mercruiser without more detailed info.
This sentence in the original post makes no sense to me. Could you rephrase?
When I took it it why we’re going to replace the cone clutch but noticed much more.
 
Yes, darn autocorrect. It was a bearing in the upper. I will post which one when I know. Fully agree with you on using Quicksilver parts, I will always use OEM parts, you may be right that it was apart, but the service records do not show this.

I meant to write: when it took it to the dealer on my lake (different dealer than where I purchased it) they were going to replace the cone clutch from the symptoms the boat was presenting - the slipping at 600 RPM to 1,500 ish RPM, and not going into gear at times. When the dealer opened it up to replace the cone clutch they saw metal in the gear lube, a destroyed bearing, which also affected the housing internals.
 
I realize from working on Jeeps that I do not have enough information to ask for a diagnosis or a fix, I’m not really asking for that or casting blame at this time. Theories are welcome or questions to ask the repairing dealer. I’m open to tips or advice when servicing or buying. I thought I had removed some variables that may have been a potential unknown issue by buying through a dealer, a low hour boat, later model boat, and owned by an employee at the dealer.

I’m open to tips and advice for this experience and future ones. Might be the outdrive was bad and they knew or did not know, might be a bad bearing, no lube to the bearing, or might be just a bad luck of the draw. I do know there was not water in the outdrive so I can rule that out.
 
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